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Ukraine Cancells Crypto Airdrop Program, Instead Embraces NFTs Plan

by Blockchain NewsMarch 4, 2022

Ukraine’s government announced on Thursday that it cancelled its plan of a crypto airdrop for receiving donations towards its fight against last week’s Russian invasion. The authorities have instead stated that they will sell non-fungible tokens (NFTs) to raise funds to support its armed forces.

Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s Vice Prime Minister, informed the public on Thursday that the nation has made the decision to cancel an airdrop for crypto donations that was announced on Tuesday and instead now plans to raise more funds through the sale of NFTs.

“After careful consideration, we decided to cancel airdrop. Instead, we will announce NFTs to support Ukrainian Armed Forces soon. We DO NOT HAVE any plans to issue any fungible tokens.” Fedorov announced on his Twitter account.

Ukraine’s government expected to start the airdrop yesterday (on Thursday) at 6 p.m. Kyiv time. However, the crypto airdrop program took an unexpected turn on Wednesday when scammers started targeting Ukraine’s fundraising attempts by creating a fake token designed to look official. Scammers created a fake token and made it look like it was the official airdrop token for crypto donors.

The fake airdrop started almost an hour before the officially announced time, but Etherscan eventually flagged it as fake. Several hours later, Fedorov announced that Ukraine has cancelled the crypto airdrop program and now plans to use NFTs to support the country’s armed forces. Although the airdrop program is now dropped, it was a successful marketing tool in getting further donations. After the airdrop was announced, the official Ukrainian crypto wallet for donations reportedly obtained $7 million in donations.

Though the minister didn’t reveal the reason why the government cancelled the airdrop, some in the crypto community were disappointed about the U-turn and others also found it strange.

Cryptocurrency Helping Ukraine

According to Chainalysis, Ukraine is one of the world’s biggest adopters of cryptocurrency, ranking behind only Vietnam, India and Pakistan. Ukraine began accepting cryptocurrencies as donations toward its military as Russia’s invasion continues. The use of crypto in the country is evidence of the technology’s benefits.

Ukraine announced the airdrop program on Wednesday after it received strong support from the crypto community and millions of dollars in digital asset donations.

In the previous week, Ukraine has been getting crypto donations in the form of Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other crypto coins. The Ukrainian government first announced on February 26 that it was accepting crypto donations. The government is reported to have received over $10 million and $16 million in Bitcoin and Ethereum respectively. To date, the total amount of crypto funds raised has reached more than $50 million.

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Swiss City Lugano Partners with Tether to Adopt Crypto Tax Payments

by Blockchain NewsMarch 4, 2022

The City of Lugano in Switzerland has entered into a partnership with Tether Operations Limited to drive its technological advancement while enabling its capabilities to allow its residents to pay their taxes through cryptocurrencies.

Per the announcement from the duo, the partnership will help to establish a centre of excellence for blockchain adoption in Europe while helping to scale Lugano’s blockchain infrastructure as it looks to become a key hub for the new technology in the European Union.

“Lugano is investing in its future,” said Michele Foletti, Mayor of Lugano. “In recent years, the city has already implemented blockchain-based solutions including the MyLugano app and its LVGA Points payment token, the Lugano digital franc, and the 3Achain blockchain infrastructure. We strongly believe in this technology, the potential to scale the technology, – and our integrated collaboration with Tether – will build a better and more open, transparent, and smart city.”

The partnership will see Tether support the city at its forthcoming event dubbed the “Bitcoin World Summit” in October this year with the theme bordering on the deep conversations around freedom of communication and finance as aspects that are the targets of revolution for blockchain innovations.

Tether will equally help the City of Lugano to transform the flexibility of its businesses so that they will start accepting stablecoins as a means of payment for their services. As the world’s largest stablecoin issuer, Tether will provide the technological infrastructure to make this and more targeted innovations happen across the board.

According to the announcement, the “Lightning Network will be one of the solutions that the City, with the support of Tether, will integrate into the services. Lightning Network has grown to become a prominent, highly scalable, and robust payment system overcoming scalability obstacles associated with the blockchain without surrendering security, trustlessness, or privacy.”

As noted, the partnerships will also feature the payment of annual taxes in crypto with formal approvals secured for Bitcoin, Tether, and select CHF-based stablecoins. The Lugano-Tether tax deal mimics a similar push by the US State of Colorado which plans to start accepting payments for tax through crypto this summer.

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Tagged : Bitcoin / CITY OF LUGANO / Cryptoeconomics / Tether

Japanese Asset Manager Nomura to Launch New Digital Company

by Blockchain NewsMarch 4, 2022

Mainstream Japanese asset manager, Nomura Holdings Inc, has announced its plans to transform its Future Innovation Company into a full-fledged Digital Company.

According to the firm, the timeline pegged for this transformation is pegged at April 1 this year.

“This is an important next step in our digital evolution,” said Kentaro Okuda, Nomura President and Group CEO. “Digital technology is a critical part of our strategic drive to expand our operations in private markets. The new Digital Company will lead deeper collaboration among internal and external stakeholders, accelerate our uptake of digital technologies, and enhance our client services.”

Nomura’s Future Innovation Company has set a lot of impressive strides when it comes to pioneering the development of digital services.

The current plans to spin an entirely new outfit from this offshoot is hinged on the company’s plans to tap into the fast-growing digital assets space. Nomura believes in new use cases emanating from the blockchain and crypto ecosystem. It can bring in new value propositions to its clients, partners, and the industry at large.

“Digital assets such as cryptocurrencies, security tokens, and non-fungible tokens are gaining presence as a new asset class. The fusion of innovations stemming from distributed ledger technology with traditional finance gives rise to a new range of services. By tapping into this, Nomura aims to expand its private markets businesses and broaden its services in focus areas including sustainability and decarbonization,” the announcement reads.

Nomura has had a long-standing interest in the digital currency ecosystem. The company invested in Crypto Garage, a Tokyo-listed Digital Garage subsidiary, back in October last year. The company’s approach to going full steam into the digital currency ecosystem echoes a related effort from other major Venture Capital firms to be a part of the growth of the up-and-coming cryptocurrency industry.

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Tagged : DIGITAL COMPANY / Enterprise / Nomura / Venture-Capital